Practo secures $30 million from Sequoia Capital & Matrix Partners

Practo plans to use the funds raised to expand to 35 Indian cities and more than 6 International locations by March 2016Vikas SN | Updated: February 12, 2015, 14:37 IST

India's premier medical institute, which receives nearly 8,000 patients a day, has started tele-booking facility to reduce hassles in seeking appointments and to cut down on corruption.Bangalore-based healthcare technology firm Practo has raised $30 million led by existing investor Sequoia Capital and participation from new investor Matrix Partners. As part of the investment, Matrix India managing director Avnish Bajaj will be joining Practo's board of directors. Practo had earlier raised $4 million from Sequoia Capital in July 2012 and undisclosed amount of seed investment in 2011.

The company plans to use the funds raised to expand to 35 cities in India from the existing six cities over the next 12 months. This investment will also be used to strengthen its International presence to six locations by March 2016. Besides India, Practo is currently present in Singapore and Philippines. As part of this expansion, it also plans to increase its existing team of 600 employees to 1,000 by next month and 1,500 by December this year.

Founded in 2008 by Shashank ND and Abhinav Lal, Practo allows users to find doctors and clinics across various specialties and book appointments instantly. It claims to list around 120,000 physically verified doctors which includes dentists, dermatologists, Ayurveda, Homeopathy, physiotherapy, psychiatrists and also advanced ones like Neurologists, Cardiologists and Surgeons among others.

The company claims that over one million users currently book around 120,000 appointments on a monthly basis and its search volume has also grown by more than 10x in the past year to four million searches on a monthly basis.

For doctors, it offers a Saas-based practice management software called Practo Ray, which allows them to store and manage patient contacts & records and share these records with patients among others. Practo provides this software through two different plans that includes a basic plan priced at Rs 999 per month and an advanced plan at Rs 1,999 per month. It claims that around 29,000 doctors are using this software at the month.

Other players in this segment include Nexus Venture Partners-backed Lybrate, Orios Venture Partners-backed Ziffi (previously DocSuggest), SAIF Partners-backed Qikwell and HelpingDoc. JustDial had also added doctor appointments as part of its transition to a services marketplace in December 2013.